The present invention generally relates to a passive turbulence control assembly and to a method for creating turbulence and more particularly, to an assembly which is selectively disposed within a vehicle, effective to allow for the selective creation of turbulent flow into at least one engine cylinder.
It is desirable to turbulently cause air to enter a cylinder of an engine prior to the creation of spark or ignition within that cylinder. Such turbulent flow (often referred to as xe2x80x9csmall scale turbulencexe2x80x9d) increases the rate at which the contained fuel is burned in order to improve idle stability, enable higher xe2x80x9cEGRxe2x80x9d levels to be utilized, reduce undesirable combustion byproducts, and reduce the variability of the amount of torque produced by the cylinder.
Typically, the air is received into an intake manifold and is communicated into the engine cylinders through two port members. Conventionally, a port deactivation assembly, operable under stored program control, dynamically determines the amount of air which is being communicated to the cylinders as a function of the engine speed and selectively and substantially closes one of the port members in response to this determination. That is, at relatively high engine speeds both port members are typically caused to be open, thereby allowing a relatively large amount of air to quickly enter the cylinders in a substantially turbulent manner. At relatively low engine speeds, requiring only a relatively small amount of air having a relatively slow speed, one of the port members is typically caused to be closed, thereby allowing the air to enter the cylinders through a single port which is effective to substantially increase the velocity of the air as it enters the cylinders and to cause the desired small scale turbulence.
While the foregoing conventional approach does provide for desirable turbulent flow, it does require some cost due to the use of a controller which dynamically or xe2x80x9cactivelyxe2x80x9d determines the engine speed and/or the amount of air being communicated to the cylinders and which actively controls an assembly in order to selectively open or fully close one of the ports.
It is a first object of the present invention to provide a passive turbulence control assembly which creates turbulent flow within an engine cylinder.
It is a second object of the present invention to provide a method for passively creating turbulent flow within an engine cylinder.
It is a third object of the present invention to provide an assembly for tunably creating turbulent flow within an engine cylinder.
It is a fourth object of the present invention to provide an assembly and a method for cost. effectively creating small scale turbulence within an engine cylinder.
According to a first aspect of the present invention, a turbulence control assembly is provided for use with an air intake port member. The assembly comprises a member which is disposed within the intake port member; and at least one selectively compressible member which couples the member to the intake port member.
According to a second aspect of the present invention, a method is provided for causing turbulent flow to occur within an engine cylinder. The method comprises the steps of receiving a certain amount of air within an intake port member; and blocking a certain amount of the air, effective to always allow at least a portion of the received air to flow through the intake port member while increasingly constricting the port member as the amount of air flowing through the intake port member decreases.